Free Republic

It’s one of the strongest opioids in circulation, so deadly an amount smaller than a poppy seed can kill a person. Until July, when drug users in the United States started overdosing on carfentanil, the substance was best known for knocking out moose and elephants — or as a chemical weapon. Despite the dangers, Chinese vendors offer to sell carfentanil openly online, for worldwide export, no questions asked, an Associated Press investigation has found. The AP identified 12 Chinese businesses that said they would export carfentanil to the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Belgium and Australia for...

Last weekend got downright bizarre in the eastern Missouri town of Sullivan, and police say they know why. Four people went on a rampage, barking and yelling, breaking into buildings, even stripping off their clothes and showering in soda water, police say. They suspect the synthetic drug flakka is behind the behavior. “We had multiple incidents this past weekend of people on some kind of substance acting out of their minds,” Sullivan Police Lt. Patrick Johnson told the Sullivan Independent News. “Barking like dogs, running up and down the street, or other farm animals, entering people’s homes, breaking into a...

It’s a new drug. And it’s a killer. Known on the street as “flakka,” the synthetic concoction is hitting hard in Florida, Tennessee, Kentucky, Ohio and other parts of the country. It’s causing a rash of emergency room visits and overdose deaths. In one highly publicized Florida case, a man reportedly high on flakka gnawed on and disfigured another man’s face before he was shot to death by police. Another user tried to break down the door of a police station in Fort Lauderdale, and a few weeks later, a man impaled himself while trying to climb a fence around...